Mayweather Raking In $41.5M For Alvarez Tilt

Pound-for-pound king Floyd Mayweather Jr., already the world’s highest-paid athlete in recent annual surveys, is unlikely to yield his crown with the disclosure Wednesday by adviser Leonard Ellerbe and Golden Boy promoter Richard Schaefer that he will earn a guaranteed purse of $41.5 million for his Sept. 14 junior middleweight unification fight with Saul “Canelo” Alvarez at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

“Floyd is the biggest star in the sport and the best in the sport, and when you’re the biggest star and you are the best, you get paid the most money,” Ellerbe told ESPN.com. “So this comes along with the territory.”

Mayweather’s purse shatters the previous record of $32 million, which he set for his May 2012 fight with Miguel Cotto and then tied for his fight this past May against Robert Guerrero. For 2013, Mayweather’s guaranteed purses will total $73.5 million.

The official contract for $41.5 million won’t be filed with the Nevada State Athletic Commission until next week, probably the day before the fight, according to commission executive director Keith Kizer.